Our major cities are tipped to become a lot more crowded, particularly with people living alone

THE population will experience a big boost in the next 25 years — but the ABS is tipping many Aussies will be living in a way that many of us never anticipated.

Michelle Hele Network Online Real Estate Editor

News Corp Australia NetworkMarch 25, 201510:55am

Our cities are tipped to become a lot more crowded. Picture: Thinkstock.Source:Supplied

JUST when you thought there was no room to squeeze any more development into our crowded cities, the Australian Bureau of Statistics has released figures which tip the number of households to increase by 4.3 million in the next 25 years.

That doesn’t mean we’ll all have to bunk down together though, as it’s also predicting a big increase in the number of people living alone.

Denise Carlton from the ABS said the number of lone person households would have the most rapid increase of all household types — up by 65 per cent in the next 25 years.

That means there will be about 3.4 million people living on their own and many of these will be older as a result of an ageing population.

More than half of people living alone are females — 54 per cent in 2011 and between 52 per cent and 57 per cent in 2036.

With more lone person households developers will have more opportunities to build high density buildings.Source:News Limited

However, there are more men between the ages of 15 and 54 living alone than women.

Louis Christopher of SQM Research said with millions more predicted to live alone in the future, it would put a lot more pressure on housing — particularly affordable housing.

He said an increase in single person households meant an increase in demand for one and two bedroom units in particular.

“Developers here will have a big opportunity to cash in on this ageing trend and build even greater numbers of high-density accommodation to house sole person households,’’ he said.

He said most of the population would still want to live close to the big cities, so unless there were major changes to making housing more affordable, younger people would still struggle to own their own home.